Dorsey
Burnette is best remembered today as the brother of
Johnny Burnette and a member of Rock 'n' Trio, and as the father
of Billy Burnette. He had a solo
career of his own, however, during the early '60s, and also wrote over 350 songs
covered by the likes of Rick Nelson,
Jerry Lee Lewis,
Waylon Jennings,
Glen Campbell, and Stevie Wonder, among
many others.
Dorsey Burnette was born on December 28, 1932, in Memphis, the older of two sons
of Dorsey Sr. and Willy May Burnette. He got his first guitar, a
Gene Autry model, from his father at age
six, at the same time that his father gave four-year-old
Johnny a similar instrument — the two
immediately smashed them. His father eventually convinced the pair that if they
learned to play guitar, they could be like the players on the Grand Ole Opry.
Dorsey was a tough kid with a violent temper and not a lot of smarts holding it
in check, and he was constantly in trouble in school and spending time with the
wrong crowd. By the time he was a young teenager, Dorsey was hanging out at the
Poplar Street Mission with future recording artist
Lee Denson, when he wasn't getting
arrested for truancy or fighting. He competed in the Golden Gloves as an
aspiring boxer, and it was at the 1949 championship that he met Paul Burlison,
another aspiring fighter. They made note of their shared interest in music, but
Burlison's induction into the Army in 1951 prevented him from hooking up just
then with Dorsey and Johnny, who had
begun playing together in the late '40s. They were good enough to get sponsored
by a local appliance store on one of the Memphis radio stations, doing country
music, and they played gigs throughout the Memphis area, principally for beer
money, fun, and girls — he and his confederates worked hard and played hard, and
music and the possibility of success that it offered probably kept Dorsey out of
jail.
Dorsey, Johnny, and Burlison finally
hooked up in mid-1952, working as a trio and within other, larger groups. They
cut their first record, "Go Mule Go"/"You're Undecided," for the tiny Von label
in 1954, their lineup augmented by a fourth member, fiddler Tommy Seeley. That
record may have sold fewer than 200 copies, but Dorsey Burnette wasn't to be
stopped — he claimed that the group auditioned for Sam Phillips at Sun, but was
rejected.
Dorsey worked his day jobs — picking cotton, deckhand on a riverboat, fisherman,
carpet-layer, and electrician's apprentice at Crown Electric. While he was there,
a day laborer a little younger than Dorsey who had grown up in the same housing
project quit his job to try making it in music after cutting a couple of
records. Elvis Presley's example, going
off as part of a trio with Scotty Moore
and Bill Black, brought the Burnette
brothers and company to the decision to formalize their work together. Burlison
and Burnette's subsequently layoff from Crown Electric made the decision a no-brainer.
As a result, in early 1956, they were off to New York, where Dorsey Burnette and
Paul Burlison got jobs as electrician's assistants while
Johnny went to work in the garment
district in Manhattan's West 30s. They decided to try out for Ted Mack's
Amateur Hour, which was one of the top new talent showcases in the country,
just at the time when Elvis Presley —
now signed to RCA Victor — was burning up the airwaves with "Heartbreak Hotel,"
and were picked to play on the program. The group, known as
the Rock 'n Roll Trio, won three
successive shows broadcast over the ABC network; by the time of the third they
had professional management, and soon after that they were signed to the Coral
label, part of the Decca Records (now MCA) family of labels. the Rock 'n Roll Trio didn't last,
either as a trio or a name, as they failed to find any hits — despite a killer
version of "Train Kept A-Rollin'" to their credit — and by late 1957 they were
getting billed as "Johnny Burnette & the
Rock 'n Roll Trio." This was probably as much a marketing ploy as a
reflection of the reality that a fourth member, in the person of a drummer, had
joined the group — Johnny Burnette was
a good rock & roll name to push in lieu of the group's moniker, although Dorsey
was the one who did most of the songwriting and had also sung lead on some of
their numbers. He couldn't stomach the change in billing or his younger
brother's sudden push to the front, and finally quit the group and returned to
Memphis just prior to the group's scheduled appearance in the Alan Freed jukebox
movie Rock Rock Rock.
He tried assembling his own group, Dorsey Burnette & the Rock 'n Roll Trio, but
they never caught on and disbanded before 1958 was over. He tried reconstituting
himself as a solo act and got an offer to go out to California to appear on the
Town Hall Party (the West Coast's leading country music showcase), rejecting the
chance to work the Louisiana Hayride. He moved his whole family — including
Johnny, who was no longer recording,
under his name or any other — out with him and struggled to make ends meet,
working as an electrician and writing songs in his spare time.
It was Burnette's brashness in walking up to the home of Ozzie and Harriet
Nelson — famous from television and radio as entertainers, and the parents of
Ricky and David Nelson — and asking to
speak to Ricky that got him his break as
a songwriter. Rick Nelson literally
pulled up on his motorcycle, accepted Dorsey's introduction, and had him and
Johnny audition right there. He ended
up recording a dozen of their songs, most of them written by Dorsey Burnette,
and his success with "Waitin' in School" got the Burnettes a new contract with
Imperial Records and Dorsey a hookup with Imperial's publishing division,
Commodore Music. Roy Brown later covered Dorsey and
Johnny's "Hip Shakin' Baby," and Dorsey
managed to get a solo hit in 1959 on the Era label with "Tall Oak Tree," a song
that Rick Nelson had rejected.
Ironically, given Johnny Burnette's
prominence, Dorsey's first hit came five months before his brother finally
reached the charts with "Dreamin'." The two successes led Coral Records to dig
into their vaults and release a 1957-vintage single of "Blues Stay Away from
Me."
The Burnettes never had another hit, although Dorsey kept writing and recording
long after "Tall Oak Tree." His contract was sold to the Dot label (now owned by
MCA), and he cut three singles and an album during the six months he was there.
During this period, eight-year-old
Billy Burnette made his recording debut on the maudlin "Little Child," which
mercifully wasn't released until 1992.
Dorsey Burnette's family life took a tragic turn from which he never fully
recovered in 1964, when Johnny Burnette
died in a drowning accident. The surviving brother, driven by guilt or
depression and his self-destructive nature, became a chronic alcoholic and drug
abuser, his musical abilities and reliability suffering in the process as he
staggered from failure to failure across a dozen labels over the next 15 years.
Dorsey found some belated comfort in Christianity, becoming "born again" in the
1970s and returning to where he started, in country music. His country
recordings for Capitol Records got him pegged as "most promising newcomer" by
one music organization that never recognized his earlier activity in rock &
roll, and revitalized his career. By then, Burnette was appearing in small
venues and playing to anyone who would pay him, getting into fights occasionally,
and taking too many drinks and too many pills. In his shows, he would do his
newer songs and a few of the old rockabilly numbers like "Tear It Up," which he
counted as country music.
Somehow, he never found the right label once the Capitol contract was over. In
1979, however, he signed a contract with Elektra Records and began recording
with fellow former rockabilly star Jimmy Bowen.
Things looked promising, and Burnette, whose fame in England had never subsided
(American rockabilly stars being treated like Olympian demigods anywhere but
America), even supposedly did a recording session with Led Zeppelin (according
to rumor). The first single by Burnette and
Bowen had just been released when Burnette died of a heart attack on August
19, 1979. Among those who performed at the benefit concert organized on behalf
of Burnette's widow by Delaney Bramlett were
Kris Kritofferson,
Tanya Tucker,
Roger Miller, and
Glen Campbell.

Dorsey Burnette will probably always be best remembered as a member of
the Rock 'n Roll Trio in association
with his brother Johnny, their work
spread between the MCA and Capitol/EMI labels (which took over the Liberty
catalog), but he spent most of his time in music as a solo act, whether he was
recording or writing songs. Apart from "Tall Oak Tree" and "Hey Little One," he
recorded an impressive array of soulful pop and rockabilly numbers, eerily
recalling Elvis Presley's 1950s and
early-'60s sound (only Burnette's songs are better), most of which are worth
owning.

DORSEY BURNETTE SINGS - Don't Let Me Go / Dying Ember / Rainin' In My Heart / A Full House / Sad Boy / He Gave Me My Hands / Feminine Touch / The Biggest Lover In Town / No One But Him / The Creator / Cry For Your Love / The Rains Came Down

HERE & NOW - I Just Couldn't Let Her Walk Away / Daddy Don't You Walk So I Ast / Together Again / In The Spring (The RosesAlways Turn Red) / Cry Mama / Lonely To Be Alone / I Love You Because / I Never Picked Cotton / The Same Old You, The Same Old Me / Healin' Savin' Sanctifyin' Love

THIS IS DORSEY BURNETTE -
I Love Being Loved By You / Ain't No Heartbreak / I Dreamed I Saw / She's
Feelin' Low / Woman / He Told Me Jesus Was My Friend / Don't Go City Girl On
Me / Lyin' In Her Arms Again / Doggone The Dogs / Molly / I Ain't Gettin'
Any Younger

GREAT
SHAKIN' FEVER - Great Shakin' Fever / Don't Let Go / Dying
Ember / Rainin' In My Heart / Sad Boy / He Gave Me Hands / Good Good Lovin'
/ A Full House / Feminine Touch / It's No Sin / The Creator / The Biggest
Lover In Town / Buckeye Road / That's Me Without You / No One But Him / Cry
For Your Love / The Rains Came Down / A Country Boy In The Army / Somebody
Nobody Wants / It Could've Been Different / Little Child / With All Your
Heart / Look What You've Missed / Gypsy Magic / I Would Do Anything.

KEEP A KNOCKIN' - It's Late / Till
The Law Says Stop / Warm Love [BURNETTE
BROTHERS] / Long Legged Linda / Way In The Middle Of The Night / Rockin'
Johnny Home / That's Me Without You / House In A Tin Top Roof / I Only Came
Here To Dance / Bertha Lou / Keep A Knockin' / Devil's Queen / Misery / Four
For Texas / Long Long Time Ago / My Honey [BURNETTE
BROTHERS]

GREAT SHAKIN' FEVER - Great Shakin' Fever
/ Don't Let Go / Dying Ember / Rainin' In My Heart / Sad Boy / He Gave Me My
Hands / Good Good Lovin' / A Full House / Feminine Touch / It's No Sin / The
Creator / The Biggest Lover In Town / Buckeye Road / That's Me Without You /
No One But Him / Cry For Your Love / The Rains Came Down / A Country Boy In
The Army / Somebody Nobody Wants / It Could've Been Different / Little Child
(with Billy BURNETTE) / With
All Your Heart / Look What You've Missed / Gypsy Magic / I Would Do Anything

THE GREAT LOST DORSEY BURNETTE ALBUM -
This Little Girl / In The Night / Alone And Blue / I'm Gonna Call My Baby /
I'm Waitin' / You Wouldn't Ask Me If You Knew / My Baby's On Her Away / I've
Learned / Let The World Go On Its Way / In My Arms Again / A Hundred Tears
Ahead Of You / Blue Monday Coming On / Flowers For Mama / A Hundred Tears
Ahead Of You / Blue Monday Coming On / Flowers For Mama

ROCKABILLY ESSENTIALS - The Biggest Lover
In Town / Buckeye Road / A Country Boy In The Army / The Creator / Cry For
Your Love / Don't Let Go / Dying Ember / Feminine Touch / A Full House /
Good Good Lovin' / Great Shakin' Fever / Gypsy Magic / He Gave Me My Hands /
I Would Do Anything / It's No Sin / It Could've Been Different / Little
Child / Look What You've Missed / No One But Him / Rainin' In My Heart / The
Rains Came Down / Sad Boy / Somebody Nobody Wants / That's Me Without You /
With All Your Heart